Free Wilderness by Robert B. Parker Page A

sense of Hood’s presence to the left of his periphery.
    The big man stopped at the front door, opened it, planted his right foot against Newman’s buttocks, and shoved him sprawling, face first, into the street. He let the door close.
    Newman lay a moment face down on the sidewalk, feeling the roughness of the concrete against his cheek. He felt as if he might urinate right there, lying down on the sidewalk. He was out of there. He was alive. They hadn’t hurt him. He’d done it and survived.
    He got up and walked down Portland Street to Hood’s car. He got in the passenger side and sat as still as he could. His heart thumped in his chest theway it did after intercourse. He waited for it to quiet. He pressed his open hands on the tops of his thighs. His hands felt sweaty and swollen.
    Hood came out of the store and walked down to the car. He got in, took the keys from above the visor, and started the car. They drove down Portland Street, away from the Union Furniture Store.
    “You all right?” Hood said.
    “Sure,” Newman said. “Sure.”

11
    “So how do you get him?” Janet Newman said.
    They sat in the Newmans’ kitchen with beer and wine and sandwiches.
    “We wait,” Hood said, “and watch. We’ll see the chance. Killing him’s easy. Getting away with it is the hard part.”
    “Janet, you wouldn’t believe what it was like to walk in there on them,” Newman said. “The guys that tied you up, one was huge and kind of slick-looking?”
    “Yes, and the other had thick lips and a long face. We already went through this.”
    “That was them,” Newman said. He drank some beer. “The same ones, and Karl, sitting right there. The same man I saw kill that woman. And I walked right in on them and got away with it.”
    “But you didn’t kill them,” Janet Newman said.
    There was silence for a moment. Then Hood said, “It would have been suicide, Janet. We agreed before we went in there that Aaron wouldn’t do anything but look and get the layout.”
    Newman opened another can of beer and drank some.
    “Bullshit,” Newman said. “When I went in Chris said don’t be afraid to use the gun. I don’t need anyone alibiing to my wife for me, Chris.”
    Hood shrugged and looked out the big picture window at the back lawn.
    “So why didn’t you?” Janet Newman said.
    “Because I was scared shit,” Newman said, “that’s why. I was in a fucking trance I was so scared.”
    “Well, when won’t you be scared? How will you do the job if you’re in a trance?”
    “Janet,” Hood said. “There were two other men in there. Three men with five shots is too much. He did the right thing.”
    “Shut the fuck up, Chris,” Newman said. Hood looked at Newman a moment and something stirred in his eyes again. The muscles at his jaw-hinge tightened for a moment and relaxed. “She can think what she wants,” Newman said.
    “What the hell is wrong with that question,” Janet said. “I am simply looking for information. I am not thinking anything. You got in. You had a gun. You didn’t shoot Karl. What’s wrong with asking why you didn’t?”
    “If you don’t know, I’m not sure I could tell you,” Newman said.
    “You tell me it was too dangerous, I understand that. I don’t want you to get killed. I don’t want you to take crazy risks. But how will I know if you don’t tell me?”
    “Maybe you better do it yourself,” Newman said. He took two cans of beer from the refrigerator and handed one to Hood. Hood put it down on the table in front of him unopened. He sipped from the first can he’d taken. Newman snapped the ring tab off thecan and threw it hard at the kitchen sink. It missed and skidded along the counter. “Maybe you better get you a gun and get out and have a go at it. Maybe that will be harder than quarterbacking from your fucking armchair.”
    The flint edge came into her voice, the one that scared him. “Maybe,” she said, “maybe I should be involved. Maybe if I’d been there